If this is your first visit, welcome to our forums! Be sure to register your account and check out the Welcome thread in Announcements. If you are still having difficulties with your forum experience, please PM any of the following PG Employees: Jesse, PGWilsooon, or PGLiz and they'll take care of you. Thanks and welcome!

Did you upgrade to 1.20? As soon as I did that I got 4 functioning trays. 3 timed and 1 untimed. I haven't had 4 working since the about the second day of playing the game. And the best part is they're actually refilling promptly as well.

Right, I have probably let the suspense build up sufficiently now . I have sat on this for a few days. I wanted to make sure it wasn't just a blip. I was going to go public yesterday until I saw there was an update. Thanks for the replies to my question. I wanted to make sure it still worked after updating. Thankfully, it does. Better actually.

Here is the basic observation:
If I have diamond clues from all open darkrooms in stock I can go for ages without a diamond trade. Literally days. It's even longer for some of you by the looks of it. If I have 0 of at least one of my diamond clues I will get a trade for it within a few trades.

This is a fairly well known idea from SP, but it seems much more extreme in HA in my experience. I first noticed the effect when I did an upgrade (using diamonds found in darkrooms and the daily bonus) and decided to complete the upgrade but not to search straight away. I was rapidly asked for the new clue. After developing the strategy outlined below, this has been repeated many times. Conversely, at one point I seemed forced back into having 1 of all my clues and I waited nearly a day for another trade to get me back down to 0 on one of them.

Here is the strategy bit:
I needed to maintain 0 of at least one of my diamond clues without being able to simply delete them. I realised the answer was the trick to exit the game mid-search without losing energy. The first iteration of the strategy was as follows. Say you are out of a particular clue. Fletcher should give you a trade for it in short order. If it asks for 2 of said clue, search the appropriate scene but quit as soon as you have found the clue item if you get 3 or 4 of them. Reload, try again, and only complete the scene if you find 2. That way, after the trade you will have maintained the state of having none of that clue. Similarly if it asks for 3 of that clue, search, and only complete the scene when you find 3. If you are asked for only 1 of the clue you are out of it is a bit more tricky. The idea was to have your other clues as low as possible too. So the trade might ask you for 1 of the clue you are out of (and you should (probably) aim for receiving 2 in the next search for it) and it will probably be asking for 1 of a different clue, which you hopefully only have 1 of. I kept this up for a while making steady progress. As I mentioned before, I ended up with 1 of all clues at one point which messed things up for a while. The second iteration of the strategy is better. Once you get the trade for the clue(s) you have run out of, continue to clear the other available coin trades until you have two or even three (since the update) diamond trades showing. Then it becomes much easier to plan how many of each clue to complete the scene with to always maintain the state of being out of one or more clues. I have been in the sweet spot ever since, trading diamonds pretty freely. After each trade is made, and you get a new one, whether it be more diamonds or back to coins, update your plans as to how many items you want to gain from a search accordingly. With the extra freedom with a few diamond trades on offer, you can even prioritise the clues that pay out a higher amount a lot of the time.

Other stuff:
If I run out of coin clues I am immediately and repeatedly asked for them, so I don't let this happen. I never go below 2 but periodically just focus on stockpiling all coin clues up to 10 of each. I started this experiment with three completed darkrooms, the first two Versailles ones at 1* and the canals of Venice at 2*. I am now at 4*/4*/3* respectively. As has been mentioned previously, the Versailles clues pay out better.

I really hope this is of use, especially for those who are struggling getting diamonds. If you think using the reload trick is cheating, without some luck you're stuffed . Now just waiting for Kate to either tell me she thought of all this weeks ago or that it's all a load of rubbish !

I can just say that it might work for some, but not for me. I can't control my trades by storing/not storing items. My payout in diamonds is still high enough. Try the strategy, but it might not work for all, I experienced the same in sp - in my original game, controlling trades was impossible after I got a transferred game it worked.

Anyway, great that you figured out something that will work for some and I'm sure others will get diamonds sooner or later, too.

Of course I tried the storing and not searching an opened scene, both didn't work but that's it. I got trades and didn't care about a strategy. Usually my diamond trades start after searching the fifth clue and waiting a few days.

Question, did you get the game early? I ask because I have only been able to open 1 dark room (canals of Venice) and the first Versailles room. I have only used film rolls for finding evidence and developing. In fact, I had 192 film rolls last night. I used 180 of them and was only able to open the first Versailles. My first two relics are complete (at 26) but I only found the 7 crowns needed for the first room.

Good stuff GD, I see some patterns too.
I witnessed in SP with ruby relics, that Kingston over there sometimes went crazy.
He asked for a relic, then he asked again, then I said I pump up to 50, just let me in peace... Guess what, he asked for all 50 in minutes.
Here, when I see a diamond trade, for which I have to search, I fulfill the coin shelves and Fletch starts asking for the same diamond relic on the timed shelves. Just happened an hour before...
If one of the timed shelf does not show anything, then I keep trading on the only untimed, till a trade appears on the timed.
Stockpiling was key for me too.

I suppose I should have read your post more carefully
Credit is yours.

Hey, it's a team effort! I was just excited you were seeing the same thing. Please continue to add observations or refinements or corroboration or completely different strategies. Besides, I didn't explicitly say that the other two trades tend to turn to diamonds quicker when there is already one diamond trade for the clue you are out of. I agree with you! I only want the credit if I get a harem out of it .

Well GD, as much as I like your explanation, I won't be joining the harem just yet...I opened a second dark room (first Versailles) and haven't seen a diamond trade yet, over 24 hours. Of corse, I need all the coins I can get right now so it isn't bothering me much. Maybe I will join.

Gd, here's my observation. The strategy seems to work on the lower clues, but the trades don't ask for a 5* clue unless I start an initial search and store clues (it could also be 4). As soon as these items are available, the 5* clue becomes part of the trades.

This might be done to guarantee that a player can afford higher coin-based upgrades.

So, GD, how many regular clues do you accumulate and how far back? Everything except dig sites and SF are at 5*. SF 3 and 4*. First regular dig site open at 1*, Versailles: first two sites open, first at 2* and second 1*. Diamond trades very rare for me. Mummy still locked. Thanks

If the sf regular sites are open, the editor will ask for items from Egypt, India, Hong Kong and sf. Gb and Italy are excluded. If you upgrade a site at sf and it's blocked, he will ask for an earlier clue from Italy again.

Kate, thanks, I will watch for any changes with 5* clues. My diamond trades are more than a trickle now, but far from a flood, so it will be a couple more days before I can afford the 956 diamond (for Versailles) 4*->5* upgrade.

Topmom, I am asked for the last 10 sites. For Kate it is 13. You will have to let some of your furthest back clues run out to see which group you are in. I agree that upgrading sites influences things and you get asked for things further back in that case. I like to keep 10 clues for each of the 10 coin sites Fletcher likes. If I engage on a sortie for diamond trades stock levels will inevitably dip. I start to get nervous if one drops to around 4 but I can go to 2 before panic sets in! At that point I top up the lowest ones and mop up any remaining diamond trades, if any (ensuring I will be out of at least one diamond clue afterwards of course!). Once all the trades showing are coins I focus on restocking. It's the worst bit after the thrill of chasing diamonds but I'm trying to keep my discipline. I forgot to say, I am only at the end of India, all coin sites fully upgraded. I don't think moving on will affect things, but I'm just focusing solely on diamonds for the moment.

Gd, Versailles is a bit cheaper than sf for the 5* upgrade and gives higher trades. So that is a good idea, but my hot sides are those from the main map (India, Hong Kong and sf), after completing the coin upgrades, in can trade around 700 diamonds while accumulating 15 shovels. Another tip (in case you are low on shovels, but can get diamonds) is to check the direct purchase.

Topmom, if you are still asked for the items and no upgrade blocks the site, don't expect a change. It's 12 in total and older items are completely excluded for me.

Your way sounds much less of a headache Kate. My Plan B was to hoard film rolls and finish the darkroom as quick as possible in the chapter after San Francisco, when it appears, and hope that it would be 'hot'. Maybe I should still do that. Plan A worked though, so I stuck with it. My best day I got about 550 diamonds, yesterday not so good, maybe 300.

It occurs to me that people could try both at once. Focus on the SF darkroom, say. It might be hot but you could also not search it right away.

Yeah AT's are showing first time for me.
The Indian "orb" there too, with pressuring 1 day quests as well.
Limited on diamonds (820), need to figure out where to spend.
Two AT's same time. RB lvl 3 and Venice dr lvl 3.
Unlock mummy curse ant the Indian "orb"...
Choices, choices...